Monday, March 30, 2015

This week we had our awesome Zone conference. Here it`s actually a multi-zone conference combining three zones into one meeting and that means that we get to see all of our mission buddies where ever they are, unless they went to work in Cobàn or Peten, but here in the Polochic we generally stay in the three zones because those are the Q`eqchi` speaking zones.

In the conference we talked about the new initiative that they`re going to do for Easter. Is it Easter already? They don`t celebrate that here, they have what they call Semana Santa, or holy week. Anyway, we also talked about chapter 8 in Preach My Gospel which is all about using your time effectively. President Curtiss let us in on a little secret. The principles in chapter 8 are great things to master because they apply after the mission just as in the mission.

As far as the rest of the week goes we did some contacting with not too good results, but that happens sometimes, we just have to talk to even more people to actually find the ones that are ready. We talked about that as well in the conference.

With the zone conference I got letters, One from grandma, two from Julie Barnson and one from Sister Barnson. Keep those letters coming.

Sorry about the short email today, I seem to be out of words, but it`s been a great week with more rain than usual that has kept the temperatures at a more tolerable weather where as the usual has been madening with how hot it is.

Saturday, March 28, 2015

As from what says my wonderful title for this week we got someone on track to get married, a pair really because you usually do marraiges in pairs. It´s a difficult subject here because many people really don´t feel like it´s necessary and it´s just a waste of money, or some people kind of want to be married but they want to spend 500Q for the food afterwards and they don´t want to get married until they´re sure that they can do that afterward.

So we have Juan and Irene set up for marriage and Irene onto baptism in April, I have forgotten the exact date at the moment, but it´s in Abril.

It was a great time for us because we had a very slow start of the week and we were kind of needing a pick me up after the long week, that we had and it makes everyone happy.

A house we found out tracting

We´ve also found a new less active in the ward, she doesn´t want to go to church because she´s from Mexico and doesn´t know Q´eqchi´. I understand where she´s coming from, so we referred her to go and attend in La Tinta where they have more than half in Spanish rather than all in Q´eqchi´. But she´s going to be able to attend the all powerful general conference that is soon upon us in Spanish right here in Sacsuha. I may be able to watch in English, but I actually doubt it and I certainly don´t mind going the Spanish route.

Vultures

Speaking of my Spanish skills I think I´m a boss at it now, I still review grammar and finding new words through reading the scriptures and dictionary searches. Because I read dictionaries now, as I´ve said before. It´s fun! You should try it! I could probably ace a high level Spanish test with ease right now.

As far as Q´eqchi´ goes, it improves and I learn fun little new words and particles that help me express myself better. All on the uphill.

This week we tried to hike up to Palomar, we realized that it was really far and probably not part of our area so we turned back halfway, it wasn´t without it´s rewards though, we found two member families that are awesome and we will now be visiting them on a weekly basis.

No mail this week, but this coming week we have our zone conference and I get mail there, or I can pick it up today because

I´m in Coban because my companion needs to do a urine test to see if his kidneys are infected, he´s been having bad kidney pains. I don´t know how that is and how you can tell

it´s the kidneys that are hurting, but he knows so I´ll go with his judgement on that.

Monday, March 16, 2015

Everyday brings new times and new experiences, but I`m actually specifically referring to the changes, I`m staying with my companion in Sacsuha like I predicted and my district is having two missionaries changed in it. Elder Wilson is going to be my district leader again and that`s actually pretty exciting for me because I love the guy. The other new Elder in my district is Elder Ellis, I don`t know anything about him but I hear good things about him. Good things indeed.

About the work this week, a little interesting we found some people that seemed to be interested at first but after teaching them a few times they suddenly turned on us and said that were not at all interested in changing religions or having us come over and teach again. That`s interesting, I wonder why they suddenly changed like that.

Elder North, Hyberson Salvador Hernandez Ortega, and Elder Menijvar

Serious Elder North and Hyberson Salvador Hernandez Ortega

Happy Day!

Good news, my good friend Caice South has received her mission call to Florida! It`s exciting and something I`ve been waiting to hear from her for a while, I`m sure she will be a wonderful missionary.

In other news that`s good my brother Mikel is now 18, I was pretty busy on his birthday with the baptism of Hyberson Salvador Hernandez Ortega, he surprised me actually by telling me that he wanted me to do the baptism and like a good missionary I told him that I would be honored to do it.

The baptism went by smoothly although it took way longer than we originally planned because people arrived late... Not actually something surprising, but they thought that it was at 3 and not 2 which meant that everyone started arriving at 3.30 and we didn`t really start at about 4. (What we call the hora chapin)

Besides that we had a really normal week, visiting members and having meetings with our branch president to get the missionary work more with members and us on the same page, progress is being made and it`s awesome.

Wednesday, March 11, 2015

As my title says I come to a close of another transfer and that`s always exciting news because it`s just an interesting time for us missionaries wondering what the changes are going to be, so if you want to know what I think, I`m staying with my current companion Elder Menjivar in Sacsuha, but transfers can be wild sometimes and unpredictable. I`ll let you know next Monday.

We had our Zone meeting this week and that means awesome learning with everyone in the Zone and it means that I get mail, so I got mail from Mom and from Grandma and from Sister Barnson. They were all very enjoyable.

This week we had our focus set on Hyberson and building the ward, this week had a very awesome branch council which started us on the right track to get things more organized and moving forward in the branch.

Hyberson is doing really well, he`s progressing incredibly quickly and will be ready for his baptism this coming week on the very important Pi day, which happens to be my brother Mikel`s birthday.

Speaking of my brother I would like to congratulate him and to tell all those that read my weakly emails that he has received his mission call to the South Africa Durban mission. Unfortunately it`s an English speaking mission but he may be a ble to puck up on some other languages there. It promises to be a hot place and humid as well, 98 percent as I`m informed. I remember thinking how can a place be 100 percent humid? I learned how to describe it, it`s like walking in a cloud.

We look foreward to another week filled with heat and adventure and more people to teach about this wonderful gospel that we have and enjoy and the many truths that it brings.

Monday, March 2, 2015

This week was a little bit more exciting than the last week, we found more people and we really put more time into going out to the farther areas and getting to know the members that live a little farther from home base, (our house) through these efforts we were able to find a couple of investigators and a couple of potential investigators in an area called the parcelas. It`s pretty much cornfields over there.

As we were walking back home from the parcelas we were called by three guys chilling on their porch having a conversation, as we went over and had a conversation with them we found out that they were interesting guys named Juan, Julio and Sergio. We didn`t talk about the gospel in detail in this occasion as we got to know them and they got to know more about us, because they asked a couple of questions about our rules, apparently Juan`s son was attending he church when he was here in Sacsuha, now he`s in the capital doing stuff there. We`ll meet with them soon and see how interested they are in making commitments to come to church and learn more about it. As we were walking that day we burned our buns off as well it was so hot.

The rest of the week went by fairly quickly, Hyberson is preparing for his baptism on Mikel`s birthday in two weeks and he is learning quickly that we`ve just had a few lessons just reviewing what he`s already been taught.

We were not able to meet with Marcos and his friends because they were either busy studying or working, but we`ll get them next week and challenge them to baptism again and see if they accept.

This P-day, or... Today! Was a very interesting day for me, we had the opportunity to go to a giant waterfall, the one that I visited near the start of my mission and got attacked by lamanites, except this time I didn`t get attacked by lamanites because we brought with us a member and he was our pass key.

Now I also got bad news today, the North family is lamenting the loss of Adam Johnson of the Johnson family, close family friends and cousins to us. I was informed of his passing by a phone call from my mission presidente who counciled me on the power of prayer for me and for the Johnson`s and any others affected by the loss of such a wonderful boy.

This was like flipping a coin to the news I received last week about my older brother Deven`s engagement, but as we in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints know. there is a life after this life, that there is hope, that Adam is happy and that through the power of the Atonement wounds will be healed, and weaknesses will become strengths.

I`ve been assigned to study more about the Atonement of Christ and I realized something this week. I finally understand the `enabling power` of the Atonement, or `perfecting power` as I call it. We find ourselves in a fallen state and a fallen world due to Adam`s fall and through Christ we a redeemed from this fallen state and we are able to repent of our wrongs, but not only that, the atonement makes it possible for our fallen bodies, our fallen minds, our weaknesses and so forth to return to perfection. Through that one act of the Atonement Christ made it possible for us to become perfect as we follow him and his commandments, if it weren`t for the atonement we would not only be fallen in sin, but we would be stuck in a fallen state of mind and body and so on. It`s still a study in progress.

I love you all, and I give a special love this week to the Johnson family as they go through this trial. I give a special thanks to Adam Johnson, I know he`s there with his family helping them and comforting them and when they are stronger and need comfort less he will still be there helping them in any way he can or helping others.

It costs $1.15 to mail a letter to him. You can use regular envelops and stamps just make sure they equal $1.15. If it weights more than a regular letter you should take it to the post office to have it weighed.